Hodel spent the last 20 years roaming the world in the travel industry. During extensive visits to Central and South America he visited the vast majority of the areas’ coffee farms.

Returning to Fort Lauderdale he was always disappointed that he couldn’t get a good cup of freshly roasted artisan coffee anywhere. He brewed up the solution: do it himself.

Hodel is now making his coffees available wholesale direct to coffee shops and restaurants in South Florida as well as online. Local residents, however, will have the opportunity to buy bags direct from the company while they are roasting.

As a true micro-roaster, one of Calusa Coffee Roasters’ strengths is its attention to detail. The company takes great care in selecting which beans to use and roasts in small batches to ensure the highest possible quality, roasting each coffee to where its experts feel it tastes best and best expresses itself. All beans are meticulously monitored for temperature during the roast and analyzed for color.

Hodel said, “At Calusa Coffee Roasters we’re passionate about doing things differently and with the focus squarely on quality. We source the best coffees in the world and strive to maintain transparent, quality-based relationships with our suppliers along the way. From plant to portafilter, we honor these people through our own fervent attention to detail at every step, quality control in our cupping labs, meticulous roasting profiles and extensive and on-going education.”

Initially the company is producing Brazilian Santos, Ethiopian Yirgacheffe, Sumatra Mandheling, Costa Rica Tarrazo, Colombian Supremo as well as some blends while Hodel adds, “Since we’re into coffee in its many forms, we offer a constantly changing palette, a smorgasbord, really, of single-origins, blends, at different roast levels. We expect more from our morning cup than just a caffeine rush —although that’s OK too.”